‘Zoolander’s Darkest Joke Was Almost Way Darker

Combining a VH1 Fashion Awards character with the plot of a paranoia-inducing 1960s political thriller may not seem like the most obvious idea for a mainstream movie comedy. But Ben Stiller’s Zoolander did exactly that, resulting in a film that is broad and silly, but also occasionally quite grim. 

And there’s perhaps no more morbid scene in the entire movie than when Derek and his male model pals stop for gas. The beautiful dummies begin playfully fighting with squeegee water, before transitioning to spraying each other with gasoline in slow motion. And it all seems like good fun thanks to “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go” by Wham!

But then tragedy strikes when one of the models lights up a cigarette and the whole car explodes in yet another “freak gasoline fight accident.”

As dark as that joke may be, it was nearly much more extreme. Stiller recently guested on the Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend podcast, and O’Brien brought up this particular scene, calling it one of his “favorite comedy moments” of all-time. 

Stiller revealed that he’s been looking at some of Zoolander’s behind-the-scenes footage recently for a documentary project (possibly the doc he’s working on about his parents Anne Meara and Jerry Stiller), and he “found an old cut of the gasoline fight.” But this version is far more drawn-out; the camera tracks the flame as it creeps underneath the car, and then we see it “engulfing each one of the models.”

“And it literally goes on for, I’m not kidding, for like maybe two minutes,” Stiller admitted, “where they’re just, like, dancing in pain.”

“Jesus Christ,” O’Brien responded, adding that Stiller’s decision was “a masterclass in the difference between ‘This way is funny. This way is not.’” 

Stiller also pointed out that the more horrifying aspects of the scene, which ultimately ended up on the cutting room floor, required a ton of effort to shoot. Since the movie was made back in 2000, CGI-ing the flames obviously wasn’t an option. So three stuntmen were “doused” in fire retardant gel and set “on fire for real.” 

The climactic explosion similarly wasn’t the result of visual effects trickery, it was a real explosion that, according to Stiller “knocked the windows out of the buildings across the street, ‘cause it was bigger than our guy thought it was gonna be.”

While Stiller seemed to suggest that the scene was condensed in the name of good taste, and that well may be the case, it’s also perhaps worth noting that Zoolander hit theaters just two weeks after 9/11. In addition to the fact that the country wasn’t in the mood for a broad, supermodel-based comedy, Roger Ebert criticized the movie for its geopolitical tone-deafness.

The studio altered Zoolander, digitally erasing the World Trade Center from shots of New York. Is it possible that the fire scene was changed for the same reason? Maybe, maybe not. But had the film randomly included a graphic death scene, it may have flopped even harder at the box office.